


no strength to call my own (tell me the truth)

by ThirtySixSaveFiles



Category: The Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation, 魔道祖师 - 墨香铜臭 | Módào Zǔshī - Mòxiāng Tóngxiù
Genre: M/M, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-16
Updated: 2019-06-16
Packaged: 2020-05-13 02:57:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,020
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19242430
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThirtySixSaveFiles/pseuds/ThirtySixSaveFiles
Summary: Lan Xichen had thought he had the measure of Nie Huaisang; recent events, however, indicate otherwise, and for the first time in his life meditation is bringing him no answers.Time to visit the source, then.





	no strength to call my own (tell me the truth)

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for a kiss meme prompt from tumblr user [fleurdeliser](https://fleurdeliser.tumblr.com/): "Where it hurts," Lan Xichen/Nie Huaisang, post-canon. Originally posted to tumblr [here](https://thirtysixsavefiles.tumblr.com/post/185461189734/4-where-it-hurts-lan-xichennie-huaisang); now cleaned up with minor edits for AO3.

It’s a rare clear day in Qinghe when the disciple shows Lan Xichen into an inner courtyard in Bu Jing Shi. Nie Huaisang looks up from his writing, face breaking into a wide, genuine smile.

“Sect Leader Lan! Please, sit, sit - they told me you were in secluded meditation, or I would have come to see you -”

Lan Xichen smiles, putting up a hand to stop the flow of words. He settles opposite Nie Huaisang before the low table, nodding to the servant who brings him a steaming cup of tea. He closes his eyes, breathing in the fragrance. This is the blend Nie Mingjue preferred, and in the darkness behind his eyelids with the steam curling through his lungs, he can almost believe he will look up to see familiar broad shoulders and strong features grinning at him across the table.

The face that meets him when he opens his eyes is more delicately featured, of course, and he will never be as tall or as broad as Nie Mingjue but Lan Xichen thinks that Nie Huaisang is growing into his own.

_Has_ grown into it, and Lan Xichen missed all of the signs. Or was led to ignore them.

“How long had you known?” he asks after the servant closes the door discreetly. “About Jin Guangyao,” he clarifies, and Nie Huaisang’s smile falters.

“I -” Nie Huaisang shakes his head. “Sect Leader - Zewu-Jun, I don’t know what you’re asking me.”

“Don’t you?” Lan Xichen breathes in, letting the scent of the tea and the pine forest that surrounds them fill his lungs. “I wonder.”

Nie Huaisang pauses. “You can’t possibly believe him,” he says, voice pleading. “Zewu-Jun, you know me. You’ve known me since I was a child, you’ve helped me as a Sect Leader. Wei Wuxian was dead and gone for thirteen years - surely his judgement can’t be trusted in this matter?”

“He’s been wrong about little else,” Lan Xichen says mildly.

“With all due respect, Zewu-Jun - he needed to have Hanguang-Jun’s very obvious affections explained to him.”

“He’s not right about everything,” Lan Xichen allows. “But I wonder if he isn’t right about this.”

Nie Huaisang purses his lips and shakes his head again, and Lan Xichen wants to reach out and stop him, to make Nie Huaisang _look_ at him; instead he folds his hands around the teacup in front of him. He hopes that Nie Huaisang will fill the silence, but instead it settles around them, heavy and pine-scented and taut.

“Why didn’t you come to me?” Lan Xichen says when he can bear it no longer, and he can hear the strain in his own voice. “Have I _ever_ given you cause -”

“No, no, no of course not.” Nie Huaisang waves his hands, the words tripping over themselves to get out of his mouth. His eyes are wide and earnest, and Lan Xichen can’t read any sort of lie there; but then he had believed the same of Jin Guangyao.

Nie Huaisang reaches across the table and takes one of Lan Xichen’s hands in his own. “There is no one my brother trusted more in this world than you. You’re a good man, Zewu-Jun, I have always known this.”

Lan Xichen curls his fingers around Nie Huaisang’s. “And did I make a good weapon?”

A shadow passes over Nie Huaisang’s face, so slight that Lan Xichen could tell himself he’s imagining it; but it’s a clear day outside, and he’s trying to get out of the practice of lying to himself.

“You are a good man, Zewu-Jun,” Nie Huaisang repeats carefully. “But so was my brother. And we both know how Jin Guangyao dealt with good men.”

He lifts Lan Xichen’s hand - his sword hand, the hand he can never seem to get clean no matter how many times he scrubs it - to his mouth. The press of his lips over Lan Xichen’s knuckles is soft and tender and implacable.

“You have always protected me, Zewu-Jun,” he says against Lan Xichen’s skin, looking up through his lashes. “I have no brother left, no strength to call my own, and so I depend upon yours. As I did that night. As I hope you will let me in the future.”

Lan Xichen feels his fingers tighten, far past what must be the point of pain for Nie Huaisang. Lan Xichen can feel tendon and bone moving under his fingers, and Nie Huaisang winces but he doesn’t try to pull away, holding Lan Xichen’s gaze. His eyes are lighter than his brother’s, but Lan Xichen recognizes the set of his eyebrows; this is as close as he’s going to get to an explanation, to an apology, to absolution.

_No strength to call my own_ \- Lan Xichen had believed that, once. He wonders if Nie Huaisang does; if this is another pretty lie or if he still believes that the only kind of strength that matters is his brother’s. 

Lan Xichen sighs, and relaxes his grip. Nie Huaisang lets him withdraw his hand without comment, resting his own on the closed fan by his elbow. His hand runs down the length of it, fingers tapping nervously on the base, and Lan Xichen reaches out to cover it with his own.

“I have too few brothers left in this world,” he says softly. “Of course you can depend on me - if I can do the same.”

A hair’s breadth of tension leaves Nie Huaisang’s shoulders, only calling attention to its presence as it leaves. He turns his hand, fingers tentatively curling around Lan Xichen’s own.

“Always,” he murmurs. There’s no hesitation or doubt in it that Lan Xichen can hear, and he’s become better at listening.

Lan Xichen squeezes his fingers gently and withdraws again, wrapping them around his teacup. He lifts it, holding it as if to propose a toast.

“To the past: may we honor its memory,” Lan Xichen says. “And to the future: may we walk its paths together.” He leans slightly on the last word, and the edge of Nie Huaisang’s mouth quirks up.

“To the future,” he agrees, lifting his own cup. “Together.”

**Author's Note:**

> You can find me at [ThirtySixSaveFiles](https://thirtysixsavefiles.tumblr.com/) on Tumblr or [@36SaveFiles](https://twitter.com/36SaveFiles) on Twitter!


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